Patricia Marie Simkins

November 2, 1968 ~ January 7, 2019

On Monday, January 7, 2019, Patty Simkins passed away peacefully at the young age of 50 after a 4-1/2 year courageous battle with Olfactoryneuroblastoma. She was born in Coos Bay, Oregon to Mary Frances (Nicholson) Berg and Joseph Arthur Berg. She is the fourth of five children, Mary Mahorney (Portland, OR), Joseph Berg (Gig Harbor, WA), John Berg (Portland, OR) and Kathleen Berg Lefebvre (Portland, OR).

Patty and her family moved from Coquille, OR to Corvallis, OR at the age of 8. She graduated from Crescent Valley High School in 1986 and attended Oregon State University. While attending school she worked at Safeway where she met her future husband Jason Simkins, in the summer of 1987. Patty and Jason moved to Beaverton, OR in 1989 where Patty began her career working for Nordstrom at Washington Square Mall. Patty quickly rose to the management level working for many of the local Nordstrom stores. She left Nordstrom in 1995 and went to work as a workman's comp Claims Specialist for Johnston & Culberson, Inc in Lake Oswego, OR. She held this position until shortly after her first child, Nicholas, was born in September 1996 before leaving to begin her dream job as a stay-at-home mom. In April 1998, Patty gave birth to her daughter, Marie and embraced every second of being a busy mom.

In September 1999, Patty and Jason moved to Vancouver, WA and quickly found this to be home.

As the kids grew, Patty worked periodically for Nordstrom and enjoyed staying connected to her professional friends. When her children reached the middle school age she could be found on the sidelines of basketball courts, cross country tracks and volleyball courts clapping and cheering for everyone. When the kids moved into club sports, she lived for the traveling and weekend-long tournaments. Patty loved the busy life of having both children in sports where she could be with them, meet new people, share stories and make lifelong friends.

Patty was known to her family as 'Patty-perfect' because in our eye's, she was. She was always happy, had a beautiful warm smile and was everyone's friend which drew you in. Once you were her friend, you were friends for life. She handled her battle with cancer with amazing grace, strength, determination and never complained. She set personal goals for her journey and achieved them. Patty had unwavering hope, faith and belief in God. She loved and embraced her family who was everything to her.

Patty led a very active, healthy lifestyle exercising daily with her close friends or her beloved dog, Henry. She loved her daily smoothie's, a good decaf, non-fat, no-foam latte affectionately called the 'what's the point' by her barista-friends at Starbucks and shopping at Nordstrom with her family. Patty was organic, what you saw when you met her was how she was any other time you encountered her.

Patty is survived by her husband of 27-yrs, Jason (Camas, WA), son Nicholas and daughter Marie. She was an amazing sister to Mary Mahorney (Portland, OR), Joe Berg (Gig Harbor, WA), John Berg (Portland, OR) and Kathleen Berg Lefebvre (Portland, OR). Patty genuinely loved being and aunt to all her nieces and nephews and a cousin to her many cousins around the country. She is preceded in death by her mother Mary Frances Nicholson Berg and Father Joseph Arthur Berg.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations be made to the American Cancer Society, Community Home Health & Hospice (Vancouver, WA) or Children's Cancer Association (Portland, OR).